• Remembering legendary Hollywood director Rob Reiner
  • Roomba maker iRobot files for bankruptcy
  • Australian prime minister focusing on tougher gun laws
  • Father and Son Identified as Bondi Beach Shooting…

Be that!

contact@bethat.ne.com

 

Be That ! Menu   ≡ ╳
  • Home
  • Travel
  • Culture
  • Lifestyle
  • Sport
  • Contact Us
  • Politics Politics
☰

Be that!

Trump gives update on wounded National Guard member

admin - Latest News - December 10, 2025
admin
9 views 6 secs 0 Comments



Trump gives update on wounded National Guard member



Source link

TAGS:
PREVIOUS
Dec. 9, 2025, 9:20 PM ESTBy Jonathan Allen and Garrett HaakeMT. POCONO, Pa. — President Donald Trump traveled to this hardscrabble and politically competitive part of the country Tuesday to tout his economic record — insisting that he’s already the architect of “lower prices” and “bigger paychecks,” as a massive sign behind him proclaimed — while voters here and across the country say their bank accounts are still squeezed. “The only thing that is truly going up big, it’s called the stock market and your 401(k)s,” Trump said to a crowd of more than 1,000 supporters packed into a cozy ballroom at the Mt. Airy Casino Resort, nestled in the Pocono Mountains. In hallmark fashion, he veered far off script and off the topic of affordability at times. He attacked Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn. — prompting a chant of “send her back” to Somalia — denigrating windmills, mocking transgender people and calling his predecessor, Joe Biden, a “son of a b—-.”But even when he focused on the theme of his speech, Trump continued to publicly wrestle with the question of whether affordability is really an issue for Americans — and whether he has done enough already to right the economy. At one point he said “affordability” is a “new word” concocted by Democrats to criticize him. At another, he proclaimed, “I have no higher priority than making America affordable again.” Trump brought allies — including Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Energy Secretary Chris Wright — to back him up. Bessent suggested that Trump has already fixed America’s economic problems. “Under President Trump, scarcity is giving way to prosperity,” Bessent said. “President Trump has put a decisive end to the three ‘i’s” — immigration, interest rates and inflation — “under Joe Biden.”But that message is at odds with what most Americans tell pollsters — and what most voters who spoke to NBC News here in northeastern Pennsylvania said — which is that they believe the cost of living is too high and they are worried about the state of the economy. And Trump’s decision to hold a rally here, which White House officials say will be the first in a series, reflects sensitivity to both Americans’ perceptions of his performance and Republicans’ chances of keeping their House majority if it doesn’t land.“I haven’t quite broken it to him yet,” White House chief of staff Susie Wiles said in an interview with the conservative show “The Mom View” this week, “but he’s going to campaign like it’s 2024 again.”Trump toured the country extensively before the 2018 midterm elections — two years into his first term — but could not stop voters from ousting a Republican House majority that year and putting Democrats in position to investigate his administration. He would like to avoid a repeat of that outcome, which eventually led to him being impeached a record two times by the House.The smaller crowd and more intimate setting for Tuesday night’s speech may have contributed to a quieter response than Trump typically gets from the faithful at rallies. The campaign-style rhetoric nevertheless included shout-outs to the locals — including a discourse on Pennsylvania’s status as a “commonwealth” rather than a “state” — about what he is trying to do for them.”After just 10 months in office, I’m pleased to report that America is winning again, Pennsylvania is prospering again, and I will not rest until this commonwealth is wealthier and stronger than ever before,” he said to cheers.Trump is now banking on his ability to sell the idea that he has fixed — or will fix — an economy broken by Biden. But as he does that, he runs the risk of falling into a trap that bedeviled Biden: losing credibility by telling voters the economy is better than they think it is. One thing he did not do Tuesday night is hint at any regrets about the actions he’s taken or forthcoming changes in course. Instead, he showed a series of slides designed to demonstrate to the audience that the economy is roaring. Outside the rally — among those who are not such die-hard loyalists that they would brave sub-freezing temperatures to see him speak in a casino ballroom — the perspective on the Trump economy is more mixed.”People don’t have disposable income like they used to,” said Robin Mathers, 51, who works part-time at a pet store in Dickson City, just outside Scranton. Mathers, who says she is a Republican but voted for Democrats all three times Trump appeared on the ballot, assessed that grocery prices “aren’t crazy” but noted that they haven’t come down, either. And, she added, her co-workers are struggling to match rising rent costs. “We’re just kind of trying to ride it out,” she said. Scranton resident Tom Tompkins and his partner, Cathy Gallagher, are a house divided — Tompkins backed Trump in 2024 and Gallagher did not. But they agreed in an interview with NBC News that the economy is not as strong as Trump rates it, and Tompkins said he would not vote for Trump again if the president were on the ballot now — citing affordability as the reason.For the most part, Trump voters are sticking with him. Bob Manci, who retired after a career as a corporate accountant for a foreign electronics company, said the economy is “doing better” under Trump. “I know a lot of people think the tariffs are hurting the economy,” Manci said. “I don’t necessarily believe that. I think overall, it will be good for the U.S. economy, as long as everybody gives them the time to work.”Trump graded his own economy as an “A-plus-plus-plus-plus-plus” in a Monday interview with Politico, even as he has continued to blame hardships on Biden. He has accused Democrats of manufacturing “a hoax” by blaming him for Ultimately, voters will have their say about his handling of the economy next November in congressional races like the one that’s heating up here.Trump won this district, which stretches from the Wilkes-Barre and Scranton to the northeastern corner of the state, by more than 8 percentage points last year. That helped freshman Rep. Rob Bresnahan, a Republican, oust a Democratic incumbent by less than 2 percentage points. Bresnahan is likely to face Scranton Mayor Paige Cognetti, an independent turned Democrat, in a race that the Cook Political Report rates among the most competitive in the nation. Bresnahan, who spoke to the crowd Tuesday before Trump arrived at the rally, acknowledged that he hears from constituents “about the challenges that they’re facing.””The message is the same everywhere we go: Lower the costs; support high-paying jobs; keep our communities safe; and listen to the people doing the work,” he said.But, he added, the policies contained in Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act — including cutting taxes on tips and overtime — have delivered results for workers in his district. “Now,” he said, “it’s time to build on this.”Cognetti, his likely opponent, said in a telephone interview that it was clear at a public utility hearing Monday night in Scranton that voters here aren’t satisfied. “Anyone who was listening to the stories of residents who are trying to make ends meet right now would know that we are in a very difficult economic environment for the majority of people in northeastern Pennsylvania — rising utility costs, rising housing costs, rising food costs, and, imminently, rising health care costs,” she said, the latter part in reference to Affordable Care Act subsidies that are due to expire if Congress doesn’t act this In voting for Trump’s agenda, Cognetti said, Bresnahan has exacerbated those problems.”The economy is not good and in our new congressman, Rob Bresnahan, we have someone who has been voting to make life harder for the residents of northeastern Pennsylvania,” she said. “At every turn, he has voted to cut programs and funding that we need.”NBC News requested an interview with Bresnahan, but his office did not make him available to talk. More than an hour into his rally, Trump introduced Bresnahan to the crowd, conferring on the freshman congressman an imprimatur that could be crucial to turning out GOP voters next year.So, in all likelihood, will Republican voters’ feelings about the economy, particularly in politically divided parts of the country like this one. Trump said the policies he’s put in place — from tax cuts to tariffs — will prove prosperous for Pennsylvania and the rest of America.“You’re going to see what happens over the next two years,” Trump said. “It’s like a miracle is taking place.”Jonathan AllenJonathan Allen is a senior national politics reporter for NBC News. Garrett HaakeGarrett Haake is NBC News’ senior White House correspondent.Tara Prindiville contributed.
NEXT
Dec. 9, 2025, 11:27 PM ESTBy Evan BushAfter a string of poisonings from “death cap” mushrooms — one of them fatal — California health officials are urging residents not to eat any foraged mushrooms unless they are trained experts. Doctors in the San Francisco Bay Area have blamed the wild mushroom, also called Amanita phalloides, for 23 poisoning cases reported to the California Poison Control System since Nov. 18, according to Dr. Craig Smollin, medical director for the system’s San Francisco division.“All of these patients were involved with independently foraging the mushrooms from the wild,” Smollin, who is a professor of emergency medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, said at a news conference Tuesday. “They all developed symptoms within the first 24 hours, including nausea, vomiting, diarrhea and abdominal pain.” Smollin said some of the patients were parts of cohorts that had consumed the same batch of foraged mushrooms. The largest group was about seven people, he said. All of the patients were hospitalized, at least briefly. One died. Five remain in hospital care. One has received a liver transplant, and another is on a donation list awaiting a transplant, Smollin said. The patients are 1½ to 56 years old. Mushroom collectors said death cap mushrooms are more prevalent in parts of California this season than in years past, which could be driving the increase in poisonings. “Any mushroom has years that it’s prolific and years that it is not. … It’s having a very good season,” said Mike McCurdy, president of the Mycological Society of San Francisco. He added that the death cap was one of the top two species he identified during an organized group hunt for fungi last week, called a foray. In a news release, Dr. Erica Pan, California’s state public health officer, warned that “because the death cap can easily be mistaken for edible safe mushrooms, we advise the public not to forage for wild mushrooms at all during this high-risk season.”Dr. Cyrus Rangan, a pediatrician and medical toxicologist with the California Poison Control System, said the “blanket warning” is needed because most people do not have the expertise to identify which mushrooms are safe to eat.Still, he said, “it’s rare to see a case series like this.”The California Poison Control System said in a news release that some of the affected patients speak Spanish and might be relying on foraging practices honed outside the United States. Death cap mushrooms look similar to other species in the Amanita genus that are commonly eaten in Central American countries, according to Heather Hallen-Adams, the toxicology chair of the North American Mycological Association. Because death caps are not often found in that region, foragers might not realize the potential risk of lookalikes in California, she said. Anne Pringle, a professor of mycology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said there is a litany of poisoning cases in which people misidentify something because their experience is not relevant to a new region: “That’s a story that comes up over and over again.”An Amanita phalloides mushroom in Hungary. The species originated in Europe and is invasive in the U.S. Anne PringleOver the past 10 years, mushroom foraging has boomed in the Bay Area and other parts of the country. At the same time, information resources about mushroom toxicity — reliable and otherwise — have proliferated, as well, including on social media, phone apps and artificial intelligence platforms. Experts said those sources should be viewed with skepticism. Longtime mushroom hunters maintain that the practice can be done safely. McCurdy, who has collected and identified mushrooms since the 1970s, said he bristled at the broad discouragement of foraging. “No, that’s ridiculous. … After an incident like this, their first instinct is to say don’t forage,” he said. “Experienced mushroom collectors won’t pay any attention to that.” But McCurdy suggested that people seek expertise from local mycological societies, which are common in California, and think critically about the sources of information their lives may be relying on. Pringle and McCurdy both said they have seen phone apps and social media forums misidentify mushrooms. “I have seen AI-generated guidebooks that are dangerous,” Pringle said.The death cap is an invasive species that originated in Europe and came to California in the 1930s, most likely with imported nursery trees. The mushroom is usually a few inches tall with white gills, a pale yellow or green cap and often a ring around the base of its stalk. The species is found across the West Coast and the Eastern Seaboard, as well as in Florida and Texas, according to Hallen-Adams, who is also an associate professor of food science at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. In California, it typically grows near oak trees, though occasionally pines, too. The mushroom’s body is typically connected to tree roots and grows in a symbiotic relationship with them. The toxin in death cap mushrooms, called amatoxin, can damage the kidneys, liver and gastrointestinal tract if it is ingested. It disrupts the transcription of genetic code and the production of proteins, which can lead to cell death.Hallen-Adams said the U.S. Poison Centers average about 52 calls involving amatoxin each year, but “a lot of things don’t get called into poison centers — take that with a grain of salt.” Amatoxin poisoning is not the most common type from mushrooms, but it is the most dangerous, she added: “90% of lethal poisonings worldwide are going to be amatoxin.” It takes remarkably little to sicken a person.“One cubic centimeter of a mushroom ingested could be a fatal dose,” Hallen-Adams said. Symptoms of amatoxin poisoning often develop within several hours, then improve before they worsen. There is no standard set of medical interventions that doctors rely on. “It’s a very difficult mushroom to test for,” Rangan said, and “also very difficult to treat.”One drug that doctors have leaned on to treat some of the California patients — called silibinin — is still experimental and difficult to obtain.“All of our silibinin comes from Europe,” Hallen-Adams said. Death cap mushrooms have continued to grow abundantly since their introduction, and Pringle’s research has shown that the species can reproduce bisexually and unisexually — with a mate or by itself, alone — which gives it an evolutionary advantage. “If Eve can make more of herself, she doesn’t need Adam,” Pringle said. “One of the things I’m really interested in is how you might stop the invasion, how you might cure a habitat of its death caps. And I have no solutions to offer you at the moment.” Evan BushEvan Bush is a science reporter for NBC News.
Related Post
October 28, 2025
Satellite images show Hurricane Melissa making landfall
November 19, 2025
LAPD source: Singer D4vd suspected in teen’s death
October 3, 2025
Oct. 3, 2025, 6:08 PM EDT / Updated Oct. 3, 2025, 6:29 PM EDTBy Gary Grumbach and Mirna AlsharifWASHINGTON — A woman who pleaded guilty to attempting to assassinate Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh three years ago was sentenced Friday to more than eight years in prison.Sophie Roske, now 29, was arrested near Kavanaugh’s home in June 2022 and told officials at the time that she intended to kill the associate justice, then herself.She appeared in court on Friday for her sentencing in a yellow jail jumpsuit. Members of Kavanaugh’s family as well as Roske’s were present at the sentencing.U.S. District Judge Deborah Boardman sentenced Roske to 97 months in prison — eight years and one month — saying that she felt Roske has shown remorse for her actions. She also ordered Roske, whom she referred to as a transgender woman, to a lifetime of supervised release.“She has taken full responsibility for her actions,” Boardman said before handing down the sentence.In a federal filing last month, Roske’s attorneys referred to her as Sophie Roske, though the case is still captioned by her legal name because she did not ask to recaption the case, her attorneys said.In court on Friday, Coreen Mao, the attorney representing the Department of Justice, argued that the crime was premeditated because Roske had bought weapons on nine different occasions and made Google searches about serial killers and mass shootings. The government requested a 30 year sentence.Mao said that if it were not for the presence of law enforcement by Kavanaugh’s home, Roske, who was 26 at the time, would have gone through with the assassination.“The primary mission was assassination, not suicide,” Mao said.A public defender for Roske, Ellie Marranzini, said her client wanted to kill Kavanaugh then herself, but changed her mind while in the taxi on her way to his house, adding that there is no evidence she saw the U.S. marshals stationed nearby. Roske’s attorneys said the government is minimizing the fact that she stopped and turned herself in by calling 911.Roske’s parents addressed the court on Friday, vouching for their child. Her father, Vernon Roske, said he believes his child “can be a positive and productive member of the community.”“Sophie has never hurt anyone,” Colleen Roske said. “It was completely out of character.”Sophie Roske also addressed the court to apologize to Kavanaugh and express regret for her actions. She said she planned to kill herself after abandoning her original plan to kill Kavanaugh, but received a phone call from her sister that gave her “a renewed sense of hope.”Kavanaugh’s wife and mother were also in the courtroom, as were representatives of the Supreme Court police department, according to a Supreme Court spokesperson.Right before handing down her sentence, Boardman acknowledged the harm done to Kavanaugh and his family.“He and his family should never have to face the fear of threat,” she said, adding that “political violence should never be accepted and should never ever be normalized.”Roske was arrested near Kavanaugh’s home in Chevy Chase, Maryland, on June 8, 2022. She was armed with a handgun, a knife, pepper spray and burglary tools, officials said.Deputy U.S. marshals spotted Roske — dressed in black and carrying a backpack and a suitcase — getting out of a cab in front of Kavanaugh’s house shortly after 1 a.m., according to a criminal complaint. Roske looked at the officers and then started walking down the street and called 911 on herself, the complaint said.Several minutes of the 911 call was played in court Friday. Roske told police that she had come to Maryland from California to hurt Kavanaugh, that she had a gun in her suitcase, was having suicidal thoughts and needed psychiatric help, according to a recording of the call.Roske allegedly told investigators that she decided to target Kavanaugh because she was angry about the possibility that the Supreme Court would overturn Roe v. Wade and about the deadly school shooting in Uvalde, Texas. She said she thought Kavanaugh would loosen gun laws, the complaint said.Roske initially pleaded not guilty in 2022 to attempting to assassinate Kavanaugh, but eventually pleaded guilty earlier this year without reaching a plea agreement with federal prosecutors.Boardman said Roske will be housed in a male-only Bureau of Prisons facility, and says she took that into consideration when considering the severity of the sentence.Boardman mentioned the ongoing litigation related to President Donald Trump’s executive order on transgender federal inmates. The order, which is currently on pause, directs the federal government to only recognize two genders — male and female — to place transgender women in men’s prisons, and cease funding for any gender-affirming medical care for inmates.Gary Grumbach reported from Washington, D.C., and Mirna Alsharif from New York City. If you or someone you know is in crisis, call or text 988, or go to 988lifeline.org, to reach the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. You can also call the network, previously known as the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline, at 800-273-8255, or visit SpeakingOfSuicide.com/resources.Gary GrumbachGary Grumbach is an NBC News legal affairs reporter, based in Washington, D.C.Mirna AlsharifMirna Alsharif is a breaking news reporter for NBC News.Lawrence Hurley contributed.
November 28, 2025
Nov. 28, 2025, 6:00 PM ESTBy Freddie Clayton and Fiona DayThe rolling plains of Kenya’s Maasai Mara and the millions of animals that live there face a shiny new intrusion: a gleaming Ritz-Carlton safari camp.With private plunge pools, butler service and panoramic views commanding more than $5,000 a night, the 20-hectare lodge has become a luxury lightning rod for controversy.Leaders of the Maasai — an ethnic group of traditionally nomadic herders with ancestral ties to the area — and conservationists warn the new tourist destination threatens a migration corridor vital to the movement of vast numbers of animals and have filed a lawsuit to halt its operations.What’s at stake, they argue, is not just a new lodge, but the accelerating pressures of tourism on wildlife, biodiversity and the very spectacle that draws these tourists in the first place. The camp opened on Aug. 15 during the height of the Great Migration, where millions of wildebeest, zebras and other grazing animals move back and forth between the Serengeti plains in Tanzania and the Maasai Mara National Reserve (MMNR) in Kenya, a process that researchers say allows animals to find food and water and maintain genetic diversity among herds.The Ritz-Carlton, Masai Mara Safari Camp. The rapid growth in lodges and camps has sometimes clashed with conservation efforts.Jiri Lizler / Marriott InternationalTourists have long flocked to the savannah by the hundreds of thousands, hoping to witness one of the largest movements of mammals in the world, as herds cross rivers and plains teeming with predators.But the new camp, which boasts “front-row seats to one of the world’s greatest natural wonders” on its website, may threaten the migration that visitors come to witness, conservations and Maasai leaders say. The Ritz-Carlton camp, on a bend in the Sand River, sits on “one of the most favored corridors for these animals,” Maasai elder Meitamei Olol Dapash told NBC News in an interview Sunday.“Any guide will tell you, that is the crossing they use,” said Dapash, who filed a lawsuit in August in a Kenyan court against Ritz-Carlton’s owner, Marriott International, the world’s largest hotel chain, as well as the project’s local owner and operator, Lazizi Mara Limited, and Kenyan authorities.Dapash, executive director of the Institute for Maasai Education, Research and Conservation (MERC), who has a PhD in Sustainability Education from Prescott College in Arizona, alleges in the lawsuit that the 20-suite camp obstructs the crucial migration corridor and is asking the court to restore the land to its original condition.He told NBC News in an interview there had been instances of wildebeest turning back to avoid the camp and that an elephant was seen struggling to find a path across the river after using the location for more than a decade.Female lions with cubs in Masai Mara, Kenya.Henrik Karlsson / Getty Images file“Attachment to the land and to the wildlife exists up to this very day,” Dapash said, adding that the Maasai had seen populations dwindling. The new camp, he added, “was the last straw for us, we just didn’t want to let this happen.”The Kenya Wildlife Service government agency pushed back at claims the lodge has impacted wildebeest migration, citing monitoring data that it says shows it does not “fall within, obstruct, or interfere with any wildebeest migration corridors” and adding that migrating wildebeest “are using the entire breadth of the Kenya-Tanzania border.”It said that “all ecological, environmental and regulatory requirements were thoroughly met and validated.”Marriott International told NBC News that the development underwent an environmental impact assessment (EIA) “in full compliance with” Kenya’s environmental protections.The company said it is committed to “the principles of responsible tourism” but declined to comment on Dapash’s claims that the Ritz-Carlton blocked a key route for local wildlife or its own steps to mitigate the construction’s impact, saying these were matters for Narok County, which manages the reserve on the Maasai’s behalf.Narok County did not respond to NBC News’ request for comment. In court documents seen by NBC News, the county claims that the safari camp complies with the Maasai Mara Management Plan, which imposes a moratorium on new developments amid concerns that poorly regulated tourism was stifling wildlife migration and threatening the reserve’s ecosystem.Lazizi Mara Limited said the moratorium is part of the case before the court, adding: “We wouldn’t want to comment on issues that are pending determination.”Dapash told NBC News that he had “no issue with business, but this is not just about hotel, it is about the long-term survival of the game reserve.” “We feel like we are losing the land, we are losing the wildlife,” he said.The lawsuit comes amid mounting concerns about the health of the 580-square-mile reserve, where tourist numbers have nearly tripled in recent decades. The Maasai Mara National Reserve reported over 300,000 tourists in 2023. In 1980, total visitor entry was 114,000. Tourism in the Mara generates an estimated $20 million annually and thousands more indirectly, according to the reserve. In 2023, tourism across the country contributed around 7% of Kenya’s gross domestic product, according to the World Travel and Tourism Council.But the rapid growth in lodges and camps has sometimes clashed with conservation efforts. “A hotel is never just a hotel,” Dr. Chloe Buiting, a vet and wildlife researcher working in the Maasai Mara, said in an interview. “It’s infrastructure, it’s roads, it’s changes to the water and the resources and the use of land.”Seasonal variation in the availability and quality of food forces animals to move around, said Joseph Ogutu, a Kenyan researcher at the University of Hohenheim in Germany. But he said developments like the Ritz-Carlton are having “a negative effect on migration, because most of these facilities are close to rivers where animals either drink water or breed or seek refuge.”Dapash’s cause has also found support among experts and tourism groups.Grant Hopcraft, a professor of conservation ecology at the University of Glasgow, who has been collaring migratory wildebeest in the Serengeti-Mara since 1999, presented maps and data to the court in October showing “regular cross-border movement of wildebeest” at the location of the lodge, according to his affidavit.RIDE International, a U.S.-based nonprofit providing cultural exchanges and immersive tours in East Africa, has also thrown its support behind Dapash’s lawsuit.The Mara has been suffering for a long time, said Riley Jon Blackwell, the company’s executive director, with “large hotel chains coming in and trying to service the luxury guests who command to see the best of the best for wildlife.”The Ritz-Carlton safari camp was “not surprising,” he added in an interview. “It’s just kind of a culmination of a long time, of a direction of things leading this way.”The camp holds a 2.2-star rating on Google Reviews, with many posters criticizing its environmental impact. Others have praised their stay at the park. A court is scheduled to hear the case in December.If Dapash is successful with his lawsuit, Buiting said it could “set a very interesting precedent” for future developments in the reserve.“From a legal perspective, this could actually be groundbreaking, a turning point,” she added.Freddie ClaytonFreddie Clayton is a freelance journalist based in London. Fiona DayFiona Day is a social news editor for NBC News based in London.Reuters contributed.
Comments are closed.
Scroll To Top
  • Home
  • Travel
  • Culture
  • Lifestyle
  • Sport
  • Contact Us
  • Politics
© Copyright 2025 - Be That ! . All Rights Reserved